Witnesses felt helpless amid the chaos while watching a Brooklyn building come crashing down

Witnesses who watched a building come crashing down in Brooklyn felt helpless amid the chaos Advertisement Updated: 6:39 PM EST Nov 12, 2026 Editorial Standards ⓘ By R.J. RICO and ANTHONY IZAGUIRRE Associated Press Witnesses who watched a building come crashing down in Brooklyn felt helpless amid the chaos Updated: 6:39 PM EST Nov 12, 2026 Editorial Standards ⓘ By R.J. RICO and ANTHONY IZAGUIRRE Associated Press Before the screams started, Dervie Mapp heard loud popping noises outside her Brooklyn apartment. She bolted out of bed to the kitchen window and watched as a neighboring building came crashing down, raining three stories of bricks and twisted metal. Stunned survivors cried out amid thick dust and piles of rubble that moments earlier had been people’s homes. Advertisement Related video above: Witness captures moments after Brooklyn building collapses “I saw the whole thing come down,” Mapp, a 67-year-old retiree, told The Associated Press on Thursday. “People were running up out of the pit, screaming and hollering. I couldn’t believe it — I froze.” The deadly collapse that occurred without warning Wednesday afternoon took down a building that housed a store selling medical uniforms on the ground level and four apartments on the floors above. At least eight people died, including two children. The dead included two men from Ecuador, José Luis Caguana Cosquillo and Gabriel Ariolfo Siguencia Yupa, according to the Ecuadorian consulate in New York. Officials said 18 others suffered injuries. New York Mayor Zohran Mamdani on Thursday described the victims as “parents and children, young families building their lives in our city and immigrants from Mexico, Colombia, Ecuador, Trinidad and beyond.” Among those hurt were four firefighters assisting with rescue efforts, which continued Thursday as crews searched for survivors through heaps of debris that included mattresses, a broken sink and a refrigerator with its door missing and food jumbled inside. Vinyl records, shoes and other personal belongings littered the rubble. James Williams said he heard loud banging at the construction site all day Wednesday as he worked at a deli across the street. He said he noticed bricks falling from a building next to the site. Then the whole building fell down. Video below: Brooklyn building collapse witness Anthony Griggs describes what he saw and heard Brooklyn building collapse killed 2 children and 6 adults, mayor says The collapse ripped away a wall shared with an adjacent building, which remained standing with the interiors of its apartments exposed — closets crammed with clothing, a stuffed bear sitting atop a pile of shoes and laundry heaped on a pink bedspread. Security camera video from the building showed an interior stairway shaking as the wall beside it fell in a loud crash and a cloud of dust. The camera later recorded a firefighter helping a resident descend the same stairs above a yawning abyss of debris. “Nice and easy,” the firefighter said as the person clutched both his hand and the railing. Despite the chaos, construction workers who had barely escaped with their lives turned around and began clawing through the wreckage to free survivors, said Mamdani. He said their swift actions saved lives. The mayor said Thursday that two construction workers were among the dead. Related video below: Brooklyn building collapse Thursday afternoon news conference update They included Caguana Cosquillo, a 26-year-old immigrant from Ecuador who had a young child and pregnant wife, his brother, Carlos Caguana, told WNBC-TV . “He was the sole provider for the family,” Caguana said, adding that his brother's wife was devastated. “She’s completely overwhelmed,” he said, “and can’t even find the words to speak.” Rico reported from Atlanta. AP journalists Russ Bynum in Savannah, Georgia; Hannah Fingerhut in Des Moines, Iowa; and Scott Bauer in Madison, Wisconsin, contributed. Make WTAE a preferred source on Google Add Preferred Source Share Infinite Scroll Enabled Top Picks Anthony Clark, a comedian and actor who starred on 'Yes, Dear,' dies WATCH: Baby bear captured on Ring camera 'ding-dong ditching' home at 2 a.m. Teen who has autism found alive after missing for nearly a week in the Australian woodlands Microsoft confirms Outlook outage affecting users worldwide